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Writer Roger Angell on a leisurely approach to reporting. “Shawn didn’t have a sense of deadline. [David] Remnick now wants it next week, which is fine. It’s that sort of a magazine, and I try to oblige. Shawn thought, Everybody knows what the news is; now tell us something else about it.” More on William Shawn.
Media kit for the New Yorker, including an issue calendar, circulation stats, and advertising rates & specifications. Only 4% of their circulation is via the newsstand…that’s a lot lower than I would have expected. Vogue’s newsstand rate is ~36% and Wired’s is ~13%.
The creators of Make magazine are launching a magazine focused on crafts called, duh, Craft.
As part of their “simplicity” ad campaign, Philips is paying Time Inc to put the table of contents in some of their magazines on page 1 (the TOC is typically further into the magazine in a more irritating position). It’s funny that there was concern about this type of advertising affecting the layout of the magazine (in the editorial/sales wall sort of way) when the whole idea of pushing the TOC to page 10 or 20 is to accomodate advertising in the first place.
On The Steve Jobs on Magazine Covers page, you’ll find, uh, … See also the curl commands for sucking down all the images automagically.
Three years ago, Jonathan Rauch wrote an article for The Atlantic Monthly called Caring for Your Introvert, one of my favorite pieces of magazine writing ever. He recently did an interview about the piece, which is the most popular article ever posted to the Atlantic’s Web site.
Between the Squibs is a blog highlighting articles from the Complete New Yorker DVD set.
Interview with David Remnick about the revitalization of the New Yorker and what exactly it is that makes that magazine unique. “My principle in the magazine - and I am not being arrogant - is that I don’t lose sleep trying to figure what the reader wants. I don’t do surveys. I don’t check the mood of the consumers. I do what I want, what interests me and a small group of editors that influences the way of the magazine.” (thx, george)
Since I’ve been skiing a little bit recently (for the first time in years), I decided to check out what was happening online in the skiing world. Specifically I wondered if there were any ski blogs out there and if the many ski magazines offer online archives of their content.
Just like every other topic under the sun, skiing is well covered in blog land; no chance for fresh tracks here. A couple of quick searches uncovered blogs about backcountry skiing, New England skiing, ski adventures from around the country, skiing products and fashion, Colorado skiing, an attempt to ski 120 days of powder, Euro-centric skiing, and even a skiing videoblog.
Most of the skiing blogs I found focus on their respective author’s adventures on the slopes. If someone wanted to start a skiing meta-blog (blogging not just skiing adventures but other skiing-related topics and pointing to other people’s adventures), would there be enough good information out there to point to? The magazine racks of ski country convenience stores are filled with all kinds of periodicals about skiing…how much of that content is online? From what I can tell, the skiing magazines do offer content on their sites, but not necessarily from the pages of their print magazines. Both SKI Magazine and Skiing Magazine have archived print articles on their sites, but only from June 2005 and earlier. Both have other resources like forums, skiing news, resort details, videos, and online-only features. Neither site is organized particularly well for quick information perusal and retrieval. Skipressworld offers PDF versions of their entire print magazine online, including the current issue. Powder magazine has some online archives as well as online-only features like videos and message boards.
And so on…Google News is currently featuring over 10,000 articles about skiing (although much of that is due to the impending Winter Olympics), Flickr has thousands of skiing photos, and nearly all the ski areas an resorts have web sites on which you can check the current conditions, the lines at the chairlift via webcams, and trail maps. Killington is even doing podcasts.
So there’s lots of skiing info out there. I know there must be a few skiers among the kottke.org readership…what are your favorite skiing sites and resources online?
Email correspondance between members of The New Yorker staff and one of Caitlin Flanagan’s sources in writing this story about Mary Poppins’ author P.L. Travers. The source, Travers biographer Valerie Lawson, wrote a letter to the editor complaining that Flanagan had not properly attributed items in the story to Lawson. “The exchange offers a glimpse at the sausage-factory aspect of how the magazine handles complaints, and raises interesting questions about what journalists owe, in terms of recognition, to their sources.”
Michael Bierut on the “slow design” of the New Yorker. “In contrast, one senses that each of the changes in The New Yorker was arrived at almost grudgingly. Designers are used to lecturing timid clients that change requires bravery. But after a certain point — 80 years? — not changing begins to seem like the bravest thing of all.”
Playboy in braille? Yup, they’re produced by the Library of Congress.
In-progress ideas for New Yorker cartoons. “Or some other recent culture reference. Or something involving wine, or Europe.”
How Seed magazine’s web site was built using Movable Type. It’s not just for blogs anymore. (via airbag)
Emigre Magazine has published their last issue (69, dudes!). Rick Poynor, in his farewell post on Design Observer, says goodbye to Emigre. Emigre fueled my interest in design back in the day.
A just-concluded eGullet conversation with Ruth Reichl, currently editor-in-chief of Gourmet magazine and former food critic for The New York Times.
Forbes has quite a large feature on the subject of communicating, with thoughts from Arthur C. Clarke, Carl Zimmer, Milton Glaser, Jane Goodall, etc. I haven’t read any of this yet; it looks sufficiently interesting to get it in magazine form for easier reading.
Speak Up critiques the covers on the recently released list of the 40 best magazine covers of the last 40 years. Chock full of snarky designy goodness. (thx armin)
The “Women of Design” issue of Step Inside Design magazine features, er, pussy cats on the cover. Here’s the story behind the cover design.
Harsh review of the user interface for The Complete New Yorker. My experience was better (changing issues took me only a few seconds), but the interface does leave a lot to be desired.
The right of Conde Nast to sell The Complete New Yorker (which is completely awesome from a content standpoint, BTW) without paying authors for republish rights is a gray area legally. National Geographic has stopped selling a similar collection because of the unsure legal terrain.
The writer of this blog hates the New Yorker, especially the David Denby part of it. From reading the site a bit, it seems to me that they actually like the NYer, but wish it were better, a feeling which I’ve had for several things in my life.
Physicist Stephen Hawking has been reduced to blinking to control his helper computer.
Adriana: “I thought you might be interested in a post I wrote a while back about a former editor of Elle who communicated for the last year of his life via blinks”.
Using your favorite Flickr photo, you can use this handy widget to make your very own magazine cover. I knocked up an issue of Hello, Cowboy! magazine featuring Tom Coates wearing a gigantic hat. Magazines have never been so much fun.
Andrew Hearst dreams up some magazines covers done in the style of George Lois, who created several memorable covers for Esquire magazine in the 60s and 70s.
The August 22nd issue of the New Yorker (which comes out on, duh, August 15th) will contain ads from only one advertiser, Target.
Is Not Magazine is a, um, magazine that is published as a poster in Melbourne.
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